Parental alienation involves the systematic brainwashing, poisoning and manipulation of children with the sole purpose of destroying a loving and warm relationship they once shared with a parent. My story involves this form of child abuse & exploring the bias favouring a mother in the social ecosystem around Family Law.

I have met and heard the tragic stories of many parents. PA is a function, by and large, of a custodial ex-partner, although some alienation can start while the couple is still together.

This blog is a story of experiences and observations of dysfunctional Family Law (FLAW), an arena pitting parent against parent, with children as the prize. Due to the gender bias in Family Law, that I have observed, this Blog has evolved from a focus solely on PA to one of the broader Family/Children's Rights area and the impact of Feminist mythology on Canadian Jurisprudence and the Divorce Industry.

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Feminists are wrong to claim
that men should do a larger share of the housework and childcare
because on average, men and women already do the same number of hours
of productive work. In fact, if we consider the hours spent doing both
paid work and unpaid household, care and voluntary work together, men
already do more than their fair share, argues LSE sociologist Catherine
Hakim in a special issue of Renewal: a journal of social democracy.

Until recently, unpaid work such as childcare and domestic work has
been hard to quantify and so mostly ignored by social scientists and
policy makers. The development of Time Use Surveys across the European
Union, however, has provided data on exactly how much time we spend
carrying out both paid and unpaid productive activities. The findings
show that on average women and men across Europe do the same total
number of productive work hours once paid jobs and unpaid household
duties are added together - roughly eight hours a day.

Catherine Hakim said: ‘We now have a much more specific and accurate
portrait of how families and individuals divide their “work” and this
data overturns the well-entrenched theory that women work
disproportional long hours in jobs and at home in juggling family and
work. Feminists constantly complain that men are not doing their fair
share of domestic work. The reality is that most men already do more
than their fair share.’

While men carry out substantially more hours of paid work, women will
often choose to scale down their hours of paid employment to make time
for household work when starting a family. In Britain, men are shown to
actually work longer hours on average than women, as many will work
overtime to boost family income when the children are at home while
wives switch to part-time jobs or drop out of employment altogether.
Couples with no children at home and with both in full-time jobs emerge
as the only group where women work more hours in total than men, once
paid and unpaid work hours are added up.

The article argues that in societies where genuine choices are open to
women, the key driver to how work is divided comes down to lifestyle
preference, not gender. Individuals fall into three categories:
work-centred, home-centred or wanting to combine work and family
(adaptive). 80% of women fall into the adaptive category, Catherine
Hakim finds, with only 20% wanting a work-centred lifestyle.

Despite this, most European policies are geared towards full-time
worker carers and ignore unpaid work, although there are several
countries that are starting to support family work. Finland, for
example, operates a homecare allowance system that is paid to any
parent who stays at home without using state nurseries, effectively
paying the carer for their work. In Germany, the income-splitting tax
system for couples recognises the work done by full-time homemakers by
aggregating and then splitting the spouses earnings between into two
halves, reflecting the idea that both benefit from the home/work
arrangement.

‘Instead of looking for the one ‘best option’ policy, governments
should offer several’, says Catherine Hakim. ‘One-sided policies that
support employment and careers but ignore the productive work done in
the family are, in effect, endorsing market place values over family
values. But the altruistic and community values embraced by
home-centred or adaptive individuals, such as sharing, trust and
cohesion, are equally as important to a social democracy.

‘Furthermore, there is evidence that men are beginning to demand the
same options and choices as women, with more claims of sex
discrimination from men. Policy makers need to be aiming for
gender-neutral policies that cater for all three main lifestyle
choices.’

(How) can social policy and fiscal policy recognise unpaid family work? by Catherine Hakim is published in a special issue of Renewal: a journal of social democracy, out now.
A copy of the final report can be found here| (PDF).

Favourite Quotes

“The job of a father is this : to help his children develop, to teach them to express and master their emotions; to avoid physiological distress, to provide a context for their experiences; to help them persevere, reach their goals and take on responsibilities; and to instil the roles of citizen, partner and parent. In short, it is to fill their bellies with bread, their brains with wisdom and their hearts with love and courage.” Camil Bouchard, “On Father’s Ground” 2002.

Some men see things as they are and say, "Why?" I dream of things that never were and say, "Why not?" ~ George Bernard Shaw ~ also quoted by Robert F. Kennedy, US Senator and Presidential Candidate assassinated in 1968.

Happiness makes up in height for what it lacks in length. ~ Robert Frost

First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win. - Mahatma Gandhi

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Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario

Western Australia (DST from last Sunday in Oct. to last Sunday in March)

Perth, Western Australia

Some Gems on relationships

Marriage is a relationship in which one person is always right, and the other is a husband.

The motto of this Father's Rights Activist

"It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood who strives valiantly, who errs and comes short again and again ... and who, at the worst, if he fails at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat." Theodore Roosevelt,

Facts on violence in Canada Domestic and Otherwise

Family violence in Canada: A statistical profile, 2009.

Of the nearly 19 million Canadians who had a current or former spouse in 2009, 6.2% or 1.2 million reported they had been victimized physically or sexually by their partner or spouse during the five years prior to the survey. This proportion was stable from 2004 (6.6%), the last time the victimization survey was conducted, and down from 1999 (7.4%).

A similar proportion of men and women reported experiencing spousal violence during the five years prior to the survey. Among men, 6.0% or about 585,000, encountered spousal violence during this period, compared with 6.4% or 601,000 women.

Total 611, men 465, women 146Rate of homicides with firearms has increased 24% since 2002. Handgun use on increase (gangs don't register their weapons)Women victims 24% - lowest proportion everMen Victims 76%Both the rate of females killed (0.87 per 100,000 population), as well as the proportion(24%), were the lowest since 196162 spousal homicides - no change from 2007Lowest rate in 40 years45 women 17 (27.4%)men

Many DV homicides of men are not classified as such and this number is higher than 27.4%.

In 2009 based on a million couples it can fairly be said 999,998 wives do not kill their husbands and 999,995 husbands do not kill their wives. (See Pg. 15 chart modified from the rate per 100,000.)

In 2009, 49 women and 15 men were killed by a current or former spouse (excludes one same-sex spousal victim).

Total homicides 610, Men 450. Gang related 20.3 percent.69.1 % of firearm related deaths involved handgunsWomen 160, In 2009 it represented the second lowest proportion (26%) of female homicide victims since data were first collected. The rate of female victims has generally been declining since the late 1960s.

Profile

I am Politically active and right of centre on most issues with the odd exception such as legalization of "Mary Jane".
I advocate on changes to Family Law - an incredibly dysfunctional arena where parents are pitted against one another and children are the victims.
My picture will sometimes show me as a younger man simply because I like them.

An Alienated Child

Is a troubled child

American Coalition for Fathers & Children Petition

A quote by a well known Canadian Jurist

The Honorable Justice John Gomery of Canada stated, “Hatred is not an emotion that comes naturally to a child. It has to be taught. A parent who would teach a child to hate the other parent represents a grave and persistent danger to the mental and emotional health of that child.”

(The above quote arises from PSM vs. AJC, a decision rendered by Mr. Justice John Gomery on February 15 1991 (SCM 500-12-184613895), and confirmed by the unanimous judgment of the Court of Appeal on June 14 1991, the trial judge was confronted by a case involving four children caught up in a heated custody battle between their parents whereby the children became "catastrophically" alienated from their mother.)A good paper on PAS for lawyers by a lawyer, Anne-France Goldwater (Avocate), and excerpts from the above trial are located here.